


He Remembered

by theauthor2010



Category: Glee
Genre: Hospitals, M/M, Parental Death, injuries
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-03-28
Updated: 2011-03-28
Packaged: 2017-10-17 08:09:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,294
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/174725
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theauthor2010/pseuds/theauthor2010
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>SamxKurt, written before 2x4 aired. Sam understood what Kurt was going through while he sat in the hospital awaiting news on his father's condition.</p>
            </blockquote>





	He Remembered

You knew your life sucked when you preferred wandering a hospital aimlessly over going home or back to school.

Yeah, Sam had been cleared to leave an hour ago, but what his mother didn't know wouldn't hurt her. He just did not want to go home to all of that blackness and school was just hell. Now, he had lost his only claim to fame. For at least a month or two, he was forbidden to play football; with this injury came the permanent loss of his quarterback position too, he was sure. With a single injury his chances of obtaining glory at William McKinley High School was flushed down the drain for good.

He wanted to go home. Not home as in the shitty place his mom landed them a few weeks ago, in this town, going nowhere. No, his home was far away in a Midwestern suburban house where he had lived with his mom and dad. Stil Sam knew that even if his mom had been able to afford keeping up the mortgage on the house, it would have never been home again. His dad had made their house a home.

He was ready to abandon his aimless wandering when he noticed a quiet presence over in the cardiology department's tiny waiting room. The boy was barely noticeable, hunched over in his uncomfortable chair, but he caught Sam's eyes somehow. He knew him somehow and wanted to know how. Hey, it was as good of an excuse as any not to leave. He tapped lightly on the doorframe to announce his presence. "Hey," he said softly. "You go to my school...yeah?"

His eyes were met with big, confused ones, reddened by tears. "Yeah," the kid responded, voice soft and low, yet higher pitched than Sam had expected. "You're Sam, the new kid, yeah?" He winced, hating that label. The pitiful creature in front of him continued. "Sam, the new quarterback, who kinda bailed on us. Which, just for your information, was a little bit pathetic." The condemnation was sharp and Sam had to think for a second to understand what it meant. Us. Oh. He was a glee club kid wasn't he? Then, Sam realized that he knew who he was talking to. He didn't have a great memory or sharp wit but he kept up with the McKinley High gossip.

That, he learned, paid off. "You're Kurt aren't you?" he asked. He wracked his mind for the gossip he had encountered, feeling a little bit like his brains were knocking around in his head . The doctor had promised him he had sustained no brain injury – now Sam wasn’t so sure. Oh, wait, Kurt. He remembered now. The kid was in his grade, in the glee club, a former football player, definitely gay and oh, he remembered now what people had been saying about Kurt just the day before. His dad had a heart attack. “Oh your dad…” How could he have forgotten that? He really was starting to think his brain cells were jostled around in there, at the very least. He now remembered more clearly the locker-room-gossip. How could he have forgotten when the gossiping had turned his stomach a little bit, made him very scared for this random Kurt person. Fag’s dad had a heart attack, totally collapsed, someone had even dared. Sam had just finished showering. “I am so sorry man. I…”

“Say you’ll pray for me and I’ll snap, I swear.” Kurt’s words were harsh, but his eyes seemed to soften some when he realized that yeah, the new kid was here, in the middle of a hospital. “What are you doing here?” he asked.

Sam was about to respond to the prayer comment when Kurt questioned him. He gestured to the sling that was now tightly wrapped around his shoulder. “Football,” he explained quietly. Kurt mouthed ‘oh’ as if he had just seen it. Poor dude, couldn’t blame him for not being all there in the head right now. Now he had a chance to respond to the prayer thing. “And I wouldn’t dare say that. Don’t worry.”

The boy’s eyebrow raised some. “Why not?” Sam had to guess that most of the people in a town like this were religious. Poor kid, must’ve been hell for him, with all he was going through right now.

Sam sat down in the chair across from Kurt’s. He was starting to feel woozy off of the pain killers and really should have gone home quite awhile ago. “I got enough of that last year,” he explained softly. He wasn’t sure how much to share but it was kind of nice to talk about it. He had been yanked from the grasp of his relatives and his mom, well she wasn’t talking about it. She was barely…talking, really.

The smaller boy seemed to want to talk as much as he did. “What happened last year?” he asked in a small voice. Even the totally unperceptive Sam got the hint of desperation to talk in his voice.

“My dad…he…died almost nine months ago.” To be honest, he realized in that exact instant that discussing his dad’s death with a kid who could very well lose his own father any second was a bad idea. Still, it had been said. “I get how bad the prayer stuff can be. It’s a nice thought and it’s good to be…you know thought about, but it would have been nice if it was toned down like thirty times over and done in a respectful way. It’s…kind of funny in a weird way. My dad’s never hid his atheism and yet half my town was praying for his soul. I like to think he’d laugh a little and tell them to leave me and mom alone for a few…”

“It just hurts to have my feelings disregarded when I need my friends most, simply put,” Kurt said in a cool, distant tone of voice. “I’m sorry about your dad Sam.” When Kurt turned back to him, he could tell the boy was crying again. Sam froze. He sucked at handling tears. He had only really let loose and sobbed once after his father died and could not make tears come at the funeral. He fought so hard against them, and to see this boy break was tough. Kurt struggled with his own tears in an elegant and tragic fight that he was losing. “How did he…you know…”

Sam swallowed and sunk down a little in his chair. “Accident,” he whispered. “H-he slipped into a coma and two weeks later…just didn’t make it.” The wound was still so fresh sometimes that when he forgot, for even a brief second, the jerk back to reality was a painful one. Sam shut his eyes but it did not stop the memories from those two weeks from flowing back onto the big screen of his mind. For two long weeks, he and his mother had sat with his dad, the man barely resembling his father anymore. A large patch of his shaggy blonde hair had been shaved off in surgery and his face was so badly bruised. His left eye was almost completely swollen over from striking the dashboard of the car. Sam would never forget the scar on his face from his eye all the way down to the bottom of his chin. It would haunt his nightmares. He blinked a few times. He hadn’t cried in months, why would one kid in the same dire limbo he once was in change that? He breathed in to control it and it just came out as one long shuddering breath.

He missed his father, plain and simple. He would give anything for someone there to talk him through this mess. He wouldn’t be such an insecure wannabe if his dad was here to talk him out of this. He would be so much better. He was nothing without his father.

He also just wanted to forget this whole mess, but he knew he never would. He’d never forget his mother calmly telling him that his father was in an accident, and then breaking down into hysteric tears when she thought he wasn’t looking. He remembered begging her to let him see his father. He remembered her allowing him to, and remembered walking into the room for the first time. He had reached for his father’s hand, held it tightly, and begged his dad to get better.

He remembered his begging going ignored and waking up around three in the morning to his aunt’s tight hug.

“I’m sorry Sam. Your dad passed last night.” His aunt laid in on him gently, while he was still waking up from finally falling asleep, exhausted, the night before. “They did all they could to save him, really.” His aunt had always been the more practical one. He sobbed, instantly.

“No, no, that’s not true.”

He didn’t remember much more than that, aside from sobbing while his uncle, more emotional than his wife, hugged him tight.

It had been the only time he was raw enough to cry, really sob at his loss. He had sobbed like he was five, and they had restrained him like you would a hysteric child. It had been release, anger, anguish, hurt and freedom from the eternity like wait for his father to wake up…or let go.

“Damn it,” he mumbled, realizing this wasn’t about him. It was about the poor kid who’s dad was still hanging in the balance. “Kurt, dude, I’m sorry. Got lost in my head there for a second. I…you…I hope more than anything your dad is going to be okay.” He wouldn’t wish that pain on anyone in the whole world.

He was met with those pitiful, kind of beautiful, tear filled eyes. “No, no, I asked remember?” Kurt said with a forced cheerfulness. Sam remembered being forcefully cheerful. It helped people pity you less.

Sam dared a weak smile, afraid of it crashing. He had held back a breakdown this long. He would not allow himself to burden a kid who’s father was very well dying with his special brand of crazy. He’d have his own overdue outburst in private. “Cool,” he said soft.

“I just…don’t know what I’ll do if he…” Kurt shook his head, refusing to allow himself the d-word. “H-he’s all I have. I…lost mom, when I was younger. K-kinda the same way you lost your dad and I need him so much. I failed him so bad…but I can’t…no I won’t, live without my dad. I can’t do this alone!” His voice was high and strained and it reminded Sam of so much. He remembered his own strangled declaration after his father was gone.

I’m going to kill myself, he had thought, but he had never built up the courage to go for that bottle of pills he had stolen from his aunt. He had lived on, even though his father had died. If this was really living, his mind added for him.

“You gotta…have faith. Not like…religious faith but in your dad I guess.” It was craptastic advice but it was the best that he really had. He was very close to crying and it was surprising he could get out a full sentence, nevertheless a decent piece of advice. “You need him, so something had to come together…” Yeah that sounded like a good bit of advice.

Kurt surprised him, getting out of the chair across from him and stretching. “Sorry, haven’t…moved all day,” he said groaning. He then sat down in the chair next to Sam’s and Sam got a good look at those tearful eyes again. Damn him. “How can you…say that, when your dad didn’t…”

Sam shrugged, trying to move away and not look at Kurt. The boy was like…a tear magnet. You just wanted to cry looking at him while he was crying. “I don’t know,” he said a little bit exasperated. “Maybe it’s that weird thing about things being meant to be. You…you need your dad. I…needed my dad too, but my mom…”

It made Sam think for a second. His mom. He needed her a lot. He had lost his dad far too tragically and he needed her. She…she needed him too. She had not been there for him to talk, like she always had and his other parental figure was taken too. It was like he had lost both parents but he could get his mom back, at the least. He needed to work with her. They needed to find each other. “I can’t…take her for granted,” Sam finished. “I just…know your dad is going to be okay.”

He looked down at his watch. Woah. It was approaching six in the evening. “Um, Kurt, do you have anyone…here for you?” he asked soft. He was surprised that nobody was in the waiting room with him. No family, no anything.

He shook his head. “I … not right now. I promised them all I’d go home and didn’t.”

“Are you still going to be here in like an hour?” Sam asked.

“Sure as hell aint going anywhere,” Kurt said with a stubbornness that made Sam realize that the entire football team could drag him out by his feet but he still wouldn’t move. He admired that.

“I need to meet my mom for dinner. I’ll be back in like an hour with some…stuff.” The kid looked like he hadn’t eaten in a week or more, and his eyes were red and sunken. He needed a friend. Sam, right now, Sam needed his mom.


End file.
